Forum rules
The Merging Technologies team cannot be held responsible for support queries logged on the public forums. If a support query is logged here and only here, it may not be found and dealt with by the appropriate team. To ensure that your support issue or bug report is dealt with properly and in good time, please use the link to the tech support request form page on the Merging website.Make sure to let us know what version you are using when you send your mail. THANKS!

It seems that you cannot route plugins so that you can mix up VS3 and VST. That's something I can easily work around. However, is there any control of pre versus post fader? And then a step further, once plugins are set, if I were to add another, how would I change the plugin order inside of vs3 or VST?

fifthcircle wrote:It seems that you cannot route plugins so that you can mix up VS3 and VST.

Correct. The only thing you can do is set whether the VS3 plugins precede the VSTs, or the other way around. You do that in the Mixer's "Configure" page, once you've made the "Effects" visible. You can switch the VST/VS3 order for each Strip, Group or Bus independently (Look for the "Flip Order" buttons, just below the list of Plug-ins).

fifthcircle wrote:However, is there any control of pre versus post fader?

All plug-ins are Pre-fader. I can't think of too many instances where I'd want a plug-in to be post-fade, but, to set up a Post-fade scenario, I'd suggest you create an Aux. Group (note the "Group" part. An Aux. Group can feed its output to a Bus, whereas an Aux. "Send" cannot.). Install your plug-in(s) to the Aux. Group and then send audio from the Strip(s) you desire to effect in this way. You can mix the balance between the Strip and the Aux., by using the Send level, as well as the individual fader levels. In an extreme case, you could make the Aux Group Send on the originating Mixer Strip pre-fader, allowing you to reduce the Strip's fader level, or even Mute it. The send, being pre-fade, will be sent anyway.

A typical use for this "post-fade via an Aux. Group" scenario would be for a reverb plug-in, where you want the reverb to react to changes in the source Strips' fader levels. You could also use this set-up to establish what is sometimes called "parallel compression", in that you could vary the mix between a compressed signal and its uncompressed source. Again, the Aux. Send's state of being either pre- or post- fader allows you flexibility.

fifthcircle wrote:And then a step further, once plugins are set, if I were to add another, how would I change the plugin order inside of vs3 or VST?

As mentioned above, you cannot intermingle VS3 and VST plug-ins. However, within each type, you can re-arrange the processing order by simply right-clicking on the Strip to call the pop-up menu, where you'd go to the appropriate plug-in type's sub-menu, and then choose to "Move 'plug-in name' Up", or "Down".

Note that every change you make when the Mixer is in its "Mix!" mode, requires a re-build (if the change will require an adjustment to the Automatic Delay Compensation), whereas, if you switch to the Mixer's "Configure" page, the re-build will only happen once, when you've finished making all changes and return to the "Mix!" page. Switching to "Configure" takes less time, when you wish to apply a bunch of changes all at once.

Bonus Answer P.S.:While I know that you didn't ask this particular question, I feel that this is a good time to point out that as a new user, you should be aware of the rather unusual relationship between Tracks and Mixer Strips, which in Pyramix is user configurable. In programs such as Pro-Tools, when you create a Track, you get its Mixer Strip created at the same time - the two are welded together, and nothing will break that connection. It can lead to the user thinking that the two are the same thing. In Pyramix, however, the connection between Tracks and Mixer is completely up to the User (well, you can link their creation, but it's your choice). You can have a Project with Tracks which go nowhere, or a Mixer with Strips which have no source. This extra layer of flexibility can be confusing at first, but it does allow you to, among other things, route the output of more than one Track to a single Mixer Strip which, when coupled with the "Auto-Solo" setting in the Track Groups Tab, allows you to have both Source and Destination Track Groups routed through the same Mixer Strips so that you are always listening to the same mix while editing.

Another aspect to the separation of Tracks and Strips is with the different functions of the Solo and Mute buttons of each. The buttons in the Track Headers on the left side of the main display, come BEFORE the Mixer, so that it's easy to totally discontinue reading from the hard drive by the use of the Track Header's Mute button, thereby lightening the demand on your system, whereas the Mute in the Mixer Strips just kills the output to the Mix Bus - the disk reading continues regardless. Similarly, the Track Headers' Solo buttons will effectively discontinue hard drive reading for all un-Soloed Tracks. It's a small distinction, but for large sessions which challenge the capacity of some systems, these capabilities can be very useful. (Well, kinda - if a Track's source audio is coming from an interleaved multi-track file, the whole file will be read anyway in order to extract the particular Track(s) you want. On the other hand, when you have separate, mono sound files as sources, then the enabling/disabling of HD reading has more significance.)

fl wrote:Note that every change you make when the Mixer is in its "Mix!" mode, requires a re-build (if the change will require an adjustment to the Automatic Delay Compensation), whereas, if you switch to the Mixer's "Configure" page, the re-build will only happen once, when you've finished making all changes and return to the "Mix!" page. Switching to "Configure" takes less time, when you wish to apply a bunch of changes all at once.

Excellent points as always, Frank. I want to add that you might consider making a habit of saving before making mixer plugin changes. At least in previous versions, this mixer rebuild was a very likely point at which the system would crash.

fl wrote:In Pyramix, however, the connection between Tracks and Mixer is completely up to the User (well, you can link their creation, but it's your choice).

I recommend using "Synchronize Tracks & Strips", found under the Tracks drop-down menu. This way, when you create or remove a strip, the tracks will follow. If you're using track groups (necessary for S-D editing), you'll need to ensure new tracks are assigned to a group. Check this in the 'Tracks' editor tab. Then all will follow under common sense.

fl wrote:A typical use for this "post-fade via an Aux. Group" scenario would be for a reverb plug-in, where you want the reverb to react to changes in the source Strips' fader levels. You could also use this set-up to establish what is sometimes called "parallel compression", in that you could vary the mix between a compressed signal and its uncompressed source. Again, the Aux. Send's state of being either pre- or post- fader allows you flexibility.

Just be aware, that the Aux Group shouldn't be used for anything that requires sample accuracy when summed with other buses and tracks. When using parallel processing, the only way to assure sample accuracy is to use "Mix Groups". All the best, -mark

fl wrote:I did not know that, Mark. I'm guessing it's because of how the Latency Compensation works (on Busses, and not on Groups?).

This problem goes back to the dawn of General Mix Buses and has always been an issue...Here is a snippet of an email from 2 years ago:

"There is however something you should be aware: Aux Busses and Aux Groups can be potentially out of sync with Mix Busses/Groups. If those Aux busses are actually patched back to a Mix Bus/Group, the delay compensation will push them ahead of time to align them properly, and then the result of the mix-down will include this shifting.No difference though with the previous legacy Aux/Groups busses behavior. Cheers, Dom________________________Dominique BrulhartHead Software EngineeringMerging Technologies

For this reason I only use Aux buses for things like reverb, where the time relationship is not critical. All the best, -mark

Hmmm, what do you suppose Dominique meant by "patched back"? It's the "back" part which confuses me. Is he talking about routing the normal way, from Strip to Group (via the "Send" control) and from the Group to the main Mix Bus via the router at the top of the mixer? Or is there some other method, which uses the internal bus routing directly?

Is the implication such that if I wish to set up a parallel compression arrangement, or some other process where bit for bit sync is required, sending a signal from a Strip to an Aux. Group (hosting the compressor plug-in) which in turn feeds the main Mix bus via the normal method (top of mixer router), should be changed so that the thing hosting the compressor plug-in is a Bus Group, rather than an Aux. Group?

Since my location recording computer can only run Win7 32 bit, I'm still using Pyramix 9 to record, even though I use 11 when I bring the stuff home to edit and mix - I often won't convert the Mixer to the new paradigm. Is the issue with sync is avoided when using the Legacy Mixer?

Reading though all that Latency Compensation stuff in the manual makes my eyes cross...